B The Michigan DailyWeekend gze Thursday, January 28, 1999 ) & A with Sidney Fine: 50 rearls and still teaching strong 0, The Michigan My Weekeni'Maga v v 'Star Wars' prequel poised to be year s biggest movie event Reel roll call: What to expect at the m Feb. 26: "Deep in End of the Ocean" March 5: "Analyze This," "Cruet Intentions" March 19: "The King and 1" March 26: "EDtv, "Go" Apr11 2: "The Mod Squad," April 23: "Idle Hands" May 21: "Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace" Summer: "Bowfinger's Big Thing," "Mystery Men," "Notting Daniel Wolfmuu y Arts Writer .SA senior Greg Epstein is just one he thousands of students who have n history Prof. Sidney Fine's stu- ts - yet he will not soon forget e's lectures. He just gives really good, solid, >rrative, well-reflected lectures. He the experience of the time," Epstein 1. "He gives you a point of view that aid be impossible to find anywhere , and he brings it to you with a nanity that few others have." ine, now in his 50th year as a pro- or at the University and his 77th in world, is indeed appreciated for his lication to both his students and :hing and for his sedulous habits - is the author of I1 books, for exam- , and still logs in a 70-hour work- -k. He considers himself to be "very ky" to be doing what he likes, an icat n of the passion he has for his- y, and maintains that it is his sponsibility" to give his students an >reciation of history. The Daily ently spoke with Fine about his ieriences in life and at Michigan. [he Michigan Daily: What about en you were in school yourself as an lergrad? idney Fine: My undergraduate rk was at Western Reserve iversity in Cleveland and I graduated 1942 and was 1-A in the draft and I I a few graduate offers and the rantage of Michigan, apart from ng a fine school, was that they had a iegr system and I was hoping I ild start in June, would finish one wester, then complete the fall semes- ter, and have my Master's degree by December. So I applied for a deferment until Jan. 1 so I could get a Master's degree, and I never heard a word from them. And then one day in the fall - I had finished the first term - and it was about midterm time of the second term - my mom mailed me a copy of the Phi Beta Kappa ... and it mentioned that a Lieutentant Commander Hienrich was going to be in the Michigan Union. In fact he was in the Michigan Union for several days, and it was the last day and the last afternoon, and he was inter- viewing Phi Beta Kappa recipients for a possible admission to a United States Navy Japanese language training school. You were guaranteed a com- mission and it would be at least a year at the University of Colorado, studying. My wife Jean and I were, what in those days was called, going steady, and wanted to get married and I had no income, but anyhow, I called the Union. It was late in the afternoon, about three or four o'clock and the Lieutentant interviewed me to make sure I was a Phi Beta recipient. I could have said any- thing theoretically; I didn't have to pro- duce documents. He wanted to know what languages I'd had, and then he said, "Ok, sign here." TMD :What were the languages you knew? SF: I had French and German and Latin in school. I knew Hebrew and Yiddish but that was irrelevant, of course (laughs). But anyhow, he said, "Sign here." And you know, I was kind of a kid; I was 22-years old, 21-years old. I said, "Can I call my mother? Can I call my girlfriend?" "No. You've got to sign right now." It was the first time I'd been away from home, you understand, and I was really young in that sense. But it sounded like a lot better deal than being a draftee in the army. Sounded like a great deal. I was going to get a commission for certain. So I did sign, and it turned out it was fourteen months of training. I had gotten married to Jean. I was a married student so I was allowed to live off base. I had taken midterms (at the University) but I had- n't finished the term. I had all As, and my mom said, "Why don't you write and see if they'll give you some credit." I thought, "That's ridiculous,' but it was wartime and they gave me two-thirds credit for practically every course. They were more generous because of the war... and I got ten hours of gradu- ate credit for the University, of Colorado, though I was in the Navy So my master's degree comes to ine while I'm in the service, which seems kind of peculiar ... So I got my master's degree, and I was finished in fourteen months, and was commissioned. TMD: What brought you to history in the first place? SF: In the fourth grade I was admit- ted to a class for supposedly gifted chil- dren, based on an IQ test. This is in Cleveland, which had a very progres- sive school system, and from fourth to sixth grade we had one teacher, just a few of us, and we got French instruction ... most afternoons, as I recall it, we didn't have formal classes. For at least a part of the day we were just allowed to read in, what seemed to a child a very big library. Now my library at home is bigger than that was, but anyway, I read FILE PHOTO University history Prof. Sidney Fine Is In his 50th year as a professor - making him the most senior faculty member on campus. a lot of history and historical fiction. And in the morning the teacher would always say, "Johnny, what did you read?" Somewhere in the time, I said I think I'd like to become a history teacher. I had no idea what that meant, except that I'd be a teacher and looked like fun.... So really that was in my mind from a very early age. I stuck with it. The only career I ever consid- ered. Teaching always sort of appealed to me. Teachers, I always had good teachers. I wasn't sure what that really meant, you understand, I was just a kid. But you know, it was the only profes- sion I ever seriously considered. TMD: What about life in general? Have you learned due to your research? SF: I often say as, a teacher, that chance is inevitable. You can't explain everything in history by cause and effect. A lot of it is sheer chance. That's one thing you learn; your luck can change in a second, the circumstances may not be what you're looking for. I think I've learned a lot about the complexity of human existence, all the factors that impinge on you at any one time. Most of us don't sit around and reflect on ourselves, but I'm always reflecting on historical characters, and pressed with the chance factor, things become hard to explain. Life, it's pretty complex. The more you study history the more you realize how difficult it is to explain things accurately. TMD: How do you think Michigan has changed in the last 50 years. SF: Oh, it's changed in lots of ways. TMD: Does that correspond to how your approach to history has changed? SF: Well, some of it is factually demonstrable. It was a world class uni- versity when I first came here, and it's still very distinguished. No problem with that, but of course it was a lot smaller. I think when I came in '42 there were only 1,4000, something like that, and the com- plexion of the student body and of the faculty was very different than today. It was lily white, pretty much. There were some women professors, but it was pre- dominantly male. The faculty came from all over, the student body has always Idrawn, because of it's distinction, froro gutside of the state, Just under a third of undergrads were from out of state, and graduates, from all over the world. Michigan always had, for a state universi- ty, a pretty cosmopolitan atmosphere. A lot of my friends were not from Michigan. The student body was not like today, where we have something like 20 percent minority... The faculty is something like 25 per- cent minority, and I think about 12 per- cent African-American, so the com- plexion, the diversity of the university is one of the most conspicuous changes. TMD: Does that relate somehow to a change of attitude ion campus? SF: Well, if you look at the courses, there more diverse also. We weren't teaching women's history, (black) histo- ry, all the things they do now. But any- way, we were smaller, but we were bet- ter supported by the state. I think it was something like the state contribution exceeded the student tuition by four to one, and if I'm not mistaken, we get more student tuition than state support, so tuition has gone way, way up. The state legislature at that time thought of us as this great world class University that they were proud to support but.... TMD: What are some of your most general thoughts about your experi- ences at Michigan? SF: It's a great university. I love being here. Good students, good facul- ty, good facilities, I like Ann Arbor. TMD: How do you feel the history department has changed most? SF: Well, most diverse offerings. History and English were always the two subjects in which women were tradition- ally enrolled but we had maybe one woman professor. The curriculum is more diverse. Back then I probably didn't real- ize how limited it was. In retrospect, though, yes, it was limited. Our view of the world was a little more restricted than it is today. So we cover just about every- thing under the sun now, more topics and more areas. I think that's the difference. This reflects, to some degree, what's going on in the world. Universities are, of course, affected by what goes on in the world. They're probably a little slower to change in some instances, but they do change. FILMS Continued from Page 2B "Idle Hands" (April 23) -Teen- mag "Tiger Beat" pinup Devon Sawa's right hand turns homicidal while the rest of him remains sane. His unpleasantness is balanced out by the devilishly handsome and sar- donic Seth Green in this comedy- horror piece. "Notting Hill" (Summer) - Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts team up with the crew from "Four Weddings and a Funeral." The sure- to-be-stuttering Grant plays the owner of a travel bookstore. Roberts, in a daring career move, plays the world's biggest movie star. If this movie doesn't break the bank, nothing will. "Bowfinger's Big Thing" (Summer) - More like "Bowfinger's Big Cast," what with Steve Martin, Eddie Murphy, Robert Downey, Jr. and Heather Graham on board. Martin plays a producer who can't get a break to save his soul, so he decides to make a movie with the action star of the moment. Whether or not the action star knows he's in the movie is another question entire- ly. "Mystery Men" (Summer) - Movie gods Ben Stiller, Hank WROTE FICTION OR A POEM YOU THINK IS PRETTY GOOD? SUBMIT THEM FOR THEY WEEKEND, ETC. LITERARY MAGAZINE. CALL DAILY ARTS AT 763-0379 FOR MORE INFO. Frustrated and disappointed with the University? Need help making sense of your U of M experience? Check out http://universitysecrets.com Azaria, William H. Macy, Paul "Pee- Wee Herman" Reubens, Janeane Garofalo, Wes Studi and Kel Mitchell are a rag-tag group of pathetically untalented superheroes who are forced to actually save their city when the local comic kingpin (Greg Kinnear) is abducted by evil baddies Lena Olin and Geoffrey Rush. Think what you will about the plot, but any movie that has a char- acter named Casanova Frankenstein seems like it would be O.K. at least from this end. Look out for many movies that people around campus don't know much about - beyond the fact that they desperately want to see them. Some of the most notable members of this category include "Rushmore," "Office Space," "eXistenZ," "Dick," "American Pie," "Eyes Wide Shut" and "Austin Powers 2: The Spy Who Shagged Me." Also, you may want to keep an eye out for a little-known and unantici- pated independent film called "Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace" (May 21). Rumor around tinsel town has it that the force is back - in force, no less - and it has the power to sink the "big ship's" box office record to the bot- tom of the sea.